Did you know that Twitter is the fastest growing social network? I have personally been on Twitter for just over a year now (@NateDesmond). During this time, I have seen many pros and cons of Twitter use. To help college students decide whether or not to join Twitter, I have decided to write two articles: one in favor of and one against Twitter. Today’s article outlines some of the main advantages of Twitter use. I will discuss how to save time and money, how to grow as a writer and student, and how to build your personal reputation and network – all by using Twitter!

It makes you a better writer. Twitter has a 140 character limit for each tweet. This forces you to learn how to communicate (hopefully) important information succinctly. Succinct writing is important because it enables you to communicate as much information as possible at one time. This skill is especially important when writing the SAT essay because you have a limited amount of space (two handwritten pages).

Keeps you connected with your friends. If you, like most students, move to go to college, keeping up with your friends at home can be difficult and expensive. By connecting with your friends on Twitter, however, you can easily keep in touch – for free.

Build a network of friends. In addition to keeping up with your old friends, you can make new friends on Twitter. Once you have a large enough network on Twitter, it is amazing how much even a simple tweet can accomplish! You can find answers to questions, job openings, and even more once you have a large enough network.

Connect with the professor. If your college professor is on Twitter, you will be able to keep up-to-date with your professor’s latest thoughts and class updates. In fact, I have ever heard that some professors use Twitter to contact their students about class projects and schedules!

Better (and cheaper) than text messaging. Twitter is surprisingly similar to text messaging. Think about it: You can send messages to all your followers (a tweet) or you can send a message to one individual follower (a direct message). In fact, Twitter is so similar to texting that some people have replaced their text messages with tweets! Although you may not want to go to that extreme, using Twitter more and text messages less will certainly save you some money.

Keep up with the latest and greatest. On Twitter, you are almost certain to hear about the newest class or scholarship…if you are following the right people. In addition, you can actually search Twitter in order to find tweets about different topics. For example, a quick Twitter search for the word “scholarship” can reveal many interesting scholarship opportunities. More than that, you can even see what people think about a particular scholarship or school! I am still learning how to use the search capability best. If you have tips, please include them in the comments.

Builds your personal brand. – Using Twitter correctly can build your personal “brand” or reputation. Personal brands are developed little-by-little in many different ways. Therefore, although Twitter is one way to build your brand, work on building your reputation every chance you get.

Make you think more about your life. – Using Twitter can help you to think more about your life. Rather than simply continuing on heedlessly, Twitter can help you reflect on what you are doing, where you want to be in the future, and, based on your goals, what you need to change to get there.

Requires a very small investment. – Most opportunities require investments in two areas: money and time. Twitter is free! It does not require any monetary investment. In the second area, time, Twitter is inexpensive. Reaping all these rewards does not require much time. For example, you could spend about five minutes a day on Twitter. During this time, you could write about 2-3 tweets – not much, but it adds up over time. Concentrate on quality, not quantity.

Twitter is fun! – Well, we are already to the last reason. This could seem like a non-reason. After all, just because something is fun is no reason to do it. Many fun things area waste of time or worse. However, when something is fun in addition to useful, the enjoyability factor is just one more reason. So get on Twitter and join the fun…while building your reputation, learning to write better, connecting with new friends, and saving money!

Bonus Tip: Get frugal college tips!

You should follow me on Twitter to get money-saving college tips. 😉 If you follow me @NateDesmond, you will be able to see all sorts of frugal college tips right on your Twitter homepage.

What is Next?

If you have not joined Twitter yet, join Twitter here. If you are already on Twitter, skip to step two.

Once you have a Twitter account, make sure that you follow me – you will get lots of money-saving tips and tricks. My username is @NateDesmond.

So Why Not Use Twitter?

I have also written a post explaining “4 Reasons To Never Join Twitter“. By writing these two posts from different perspectives, I hope to reveal the pros and cons of Twitter, so college students can make an educated decision.

5 thoughts on “Why Every Student Should Join Twitter Immediately!”

Hi Nate, interesting perspective! I think the most important benefit that you listed is how it forces you to communicate with succinct thoughts.

I’ve been using Twitter for quite a while. I’m not sure what it is, but I just can’t seem to get into it. I suppose a lot of it comes down to following the right people and not being overwhelmed by having too much info coming in from too many people.

I agree that following the right people is the key to using Twitter productively. I used to automatically follow everyone who followed me, but I found it cluttered my twitter page with spam-type tweets.

@ Stefan

I agree that Twitter is not necessary for students. Like I said in my post – today I am presenting reasons to join Twitter, but next week I will present reasons not to join Twitter. I want to show both the pros and cons.

An interesting thing I’ve noticed in college is that Twitter has caught on far more with adults than with students. I’m taking a class about Web 2.0, and every adult speaker that’s come in has raved on and on about Twitter, yet few students in the class even have one. Many who do have one tend to use it to follow adults rather than their peers.